France Military Budget 2015

France has announced a defence budget for 2015 that is static in nominal terms, although investment in equipment procurement and maintenance will increase by almost EUR1.5 billion. Expenditure of EUR31.4 (or EUR39.2 billion including pensions) was announced in the Projet de Loi de Finances (PLF) 2015 which was released on 2 October; figures that compared with investment of EUR31.37 billion (or EUR39.26 billion including pensions) in 2014. The level of expenditure is consistent with France's six-year defence spending programme - the Projet de Loi de Programmation Militaire (LPM) 2014-2019 - which was released on 2 August 2013. The LPM outlined defence spending that would remain static in nominal terms from 2013 to 2016 at circa EUR31.4 billion per annum before rising slightly to EUR31.56 billion in 2017, EUR31.78 billion in 2018 and EUR35.51 billion in 2019.